Background

Commissioned as the feature attraction for the Ontario Pavilion at Expo 67 -
the Universal and International Exposition at Montreal, where it was
premiered to the public on April 28, 1967 and presented continuously daily
until October 29, 1967 in a 570-capacity cinema, and subsequently released
theatrically in 35mm anamorphic and 16mm letterbox versions.

"A Place to Stand" was produced and directed by Christopher Chapman for the
Ontario Pavilion at Expo 67 in Montreal. The film premiered on April 28,
1967 in a 70mm print by Technicolor, on a screen 66 feet wide by 30 feet
high, with six-channel stereo surround sound. Using images, music and sound
effects without spoken narration or titles, the film tells about life in
Ontario, presenting about an hour-and-a-half of footage in its 18-minute
running time. This is accomplished by what Chapman calls his multi-dynamic
image technique, a groundbreaking multiple screen, variable picture
presentation that allows viewers to see many images within different panels,
up to 15 scenes simultaneously on one screen.

Nearly every major Hollywood studio purchased prints of Chapman's film to screen for executives, producers and directors. Columbia Pictures distributed the film to movie theatres throughout the United States and Canada. "A Place to Stand" clearly influenced the composition of subsequent film images. An early prominent example of this influence was Norman Jewison's 1968 film "The Thomas Crown Affair", which featured Chapman's multi-dynamic image process in key scenes of the story. Jewison publicly acknowledged Chapman as creator of the technique.

Christopher Chapman's "A Place to Stand" was nominated in two categories for an Academy Award, including Best Documentary Short Subject. The film won in the Best Live Action Short Subject category and Chapman accepted the Oscar on April 10, 1968, during the 40th annual Academy Awards presentation at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium. George C. Konder

Awards

1967 Oscar Win:
Best Live Action Short Subject

1967 Nominated Oscar:
Best Documentary, Short Subjects

1968 Canadian Film Awards:
Best Sound Editing (Non-Feature) Kenneth Heeley-Ray.
Best Film of the Year Christopher Chapman

Promotional Media Releaase Text (1967) (transcribed)

The Ontario Pavilion film presentation - A Place to Stand

Exposition communication is becoming increasingly sophisticated. Among the
many varieties of film techniques which have been developed, certain main
types may be distinguished. There is multiple screen, where many different
pictures are presented on a number of different screens. There is the
variable picture, where a single picture may change its shape and size and
move on a single screen.

The subject of the Ontario Pavilion film presentation is the Province of
Ontario itself. To do justice to a subject of such enormous scope and
complexity, a combination of these techniques was employed, using the added
technical advantage of a system that enables a multiple screen/variable
picture to be assembled and projected through a single 65mm [sic] film. The
screen on which our film is projected is 66 feet wide by 30 feet high - one
of the largest in North America. To the best of our knowledge this is the
first time that a combination of these techniques has been exhibited on such
a complicated and extensive scale, creating a new dimension in film
presentation, not limited by special conditions of an exposition, but
allowing world theatrical distribution.

Once the technique had been chosen, it was a case of imagining the effect,
discovering the way to shoot for this new format, and working the entire
film out on specially devised editing charts. It was understood from the
beginning that because of shortage in time there would be no opportunity to
make changes in the film once it returned from the complex optical work.
This was a very sobering thought since almost all the rhythms which are
essential to the pace of any film had to be finalized on paper rather than
on the film itself.

The production was begun by three people in the fall of 1965. The shooting
was completed by July 15, 1966, except for an additional 75,000 feet shot by
other cameramen. This work was done on a seven-day basis throughout. A total
of 200,000 feet of 35mm film was shot out of which the Ontario Pavilion film
presentation was to come. Four months after the commencement of editing, the
last of the editing charts was completed and shipped to Film Effects where
the optical work had to be done. This technique was as new to them as it was
to us - on the scale we were doing it. On March 4, 1967, the last for the
film returned from it optical work. This was the first time the edited film
could be seen. Two days later it was returned for final optical revisions
and color printing by Technicolor.

The complex six dimensional sound tracks were by then being laid and were
complete by March 15. From March 1 to March 16 the music was composed, a
demonstration piece having been previously recorded. On March 18 the
recording session was held in Toronto with a 45-piece orchestra and a chorus
of 15 voices.

The film effects track has been closely designed to the picture and new
strides have been made in the area of sound to picture. Six track stereo
sound accompanies the picture. The track is designed to individualize the
screens [sic] where desired, and to create a total environment for the
audience. The sound track consists of the sounds of Ontario, the special
musical score, and the Ontario song written for the film.

This is a new dimension in film which requires a new way to look at the
subject, a new way to photograph, a new way to edit, and a new way in
communication of the edited concept to the laboratories, and which also
requires a new way to view the finished film. One might ask how you can
“see” so many pictures all at once. It is not a case of “seeing” all these
pictures, but sensing an environment of pictures around one dominant one.

The film might be described as a rhythmic kaleidoscope of life in Ontario.
In some way, perhaps subliminally, almost every aspect of Ontario appears.

Newspaper / Magazine Articles (transcribed)

The birth of A Place to Stand
By Chapman, Christopher
Pâquet, André (ed) How to make or not to make a Canadian film
(Montreal: La Cinémathèque canadienne, 1968)

The film for the Ontario Government at Expo 67 is for me the culmination of
a desire I had some years ago to try a moving multiple screen technique. I
had never seen it done but I, myself, had experimented with panning a
projector over a very large screen and was fascinated by the viewer’s
relationship to a panning camera and a panning screen.

In the conventional film for example, when viewing a pan across a landscape
we watch the landscape move across a static screen. As soon as that screen
moves with the pan we are watching a static landscape being revealed by a
moving screen or “window”. While I did not explore this to any great extent
in the Ontario film it was the basis for my direction of thought. It was
this idea plus a dynamic screen technique (that I had heard of but not seen)
that led me to explore the idea when I was originally making a presentation
for the Telephone Association Pavilion at Expo 67. The dynamic screen
consists of a matte covering the whole picture but allowing one part of the
picture to be revealed through a “window”. This “window” would increase or
decrease in size.

A phone call to a lab in Hollywood warned me against the dynamic screen
technique as it had been a failure in its latest adoption. My concern was
whether it was a failure due to technical difficulties or creative misuse.
Later while already well into the Ontario film we saw a print of "A Door in
the Wall", using the dynamic screen, and it was clear that its failure was
creative not technical.

When I was asked by David Mackay of TDF to produce and direct the Ontario
film, there was no idea as to what the project involved. The only thing we
knew was that we had to produce an unusual film in 18 months. My one desire
then was to make a film that would give everyone as big boost and make them
feel good, but it was not easy condensing Ontario - particularly a province
that is so industrialized.

There was no script. Time would have been required to develop a definite
theme idea but time was extremely limited. Out of our discussion emerged the
dynamic-multiple screen concept that I had long dreamed of. The key was a
gigantic flat screen - a “mural” surface that one really could move upon and
break up with multiple images.

Barry Gordon, whom I had requested to be technical producer for the film,
immediately set off for Hollywood to discover whether the required
complicated processing could be done.

Shooting on location was exploring completely new territory. An early
mistake was making the shots I wanted to retain on the screen through a
complete sequence of events, too short. The movement of the camera and the
action within the frame had to be considered in a new way, which in
documentary shooting is not always possible. I had to consider less
interesting shots or deliberately make a shot less interesting. Such a shot
might be an important element in a sequence but not the dominant one. A
multiple of equally interesting shots might confuse the audience. Shots that
I used to look at as normal academy frame proportions I now looked at with
an eye to vertical frames and horizontal frames, odd frames, small frames
and large frames.

Since access to a 70 mm camera [sic] was impossible due to lack of time,
another difficulty encountered was deciding, through consultation with Barry
Gordon, whether a shot would retain its clarity when blown up to 70 mm.
Blowing up 35 mm to such as screen as 66' x 30' which is the Pavilion
screen, meant a very great stretch and not very many shots could stand it.
This meant I would shoot a full screen landscape as 2 divided screens, which
to me was unsatisfactory. Going to 3 or 4 composite screens was not the same
problem as I used these as part of the design format.

180,000 feet of film were shot. Some additional footage of material I had
not time to shoot myself was shot by David Mackay, using
TDF cameramen. After completely familiarising myself with the footage, I
worked out a storyboard of the entire film. Although it was theoretical, it
did give me an impression of how the subject matter could be structured. I
then had to devise my own charts as did Barry Gordon who translated my
charts into his own lab charts in a language that the lab could comprehend.
The lab was most impressed with the clarity of Barry Gordon’s technical
instructions.

To edit the film I had a 2 picture head moviola which was the closest one
could get to visualising the results. One could only use it to compare
actions of any 2 shots at one time and designate the length of shots. In
normal film editing, one works with the actual footage and soon discovers
that frame or two on any shot can make a difference in rhythm. With the
Ontario film I could never “see” the film develop. The charts indicated the
movement of the shots. Because of the shortage in time their could be no
changes in structure in any of the sequences once they returned from the
lab. It was a tremendous discipline for me, for once I had made a creative
decision, I could not change my mind. The entire concept of development
therefore, was on paper in chart form.

Ken Heely-Ray of ADS (formerly of the NFB) laid the extremely complicated 6
tracks of film effects and music. It took 6 days to mix the 6 tracks at
Todd-A-O in Hollywood.

When all the sequences of the film were finally assembled after 4 months of
optical work, there were 2 days to assemble them, see the completed film for
the first time and return it to the lab for final processing. This gave the
composer Dolores Claman 2 weeks to write the musical score which was
arranged by Jerry Toth. The basis of the song “A Place to Stand” was
suggested by David Mackay from a quotation of Archimedes, and the lyrics
were written by Richard Morris.

I am very grateful to the Commissioner of the Ontario Pavilion, J.W. Ramsay
who, although he must have been anxious at many turning points, particularly
since we were delving into such an unknown area of film, never once
interfered in content, direction or completion. David Mackay of TDF also
allowed me complete freedom, leaving all decisions to me. I feel that great
deal of the film’s success is due to this trust.

The film was conceived as a mural or painting would be. Its development was
very personal, consequently it has the bad and the good of a single concept.
My own connection with the film now is only through the audience. Perhaps
some day I will view it unattached.